Alex Kava Bundle - Alex Kava [187]
The images from the scattered photos stared out at Maggie, just as horrific in black and white as they had been in color. There were close-ups of slashed throats, chewed-off nipples, mutilated vaginas and an assortment of extracted organs. Earlier, with only a glance, she had discovered how many of the reports she still knew by heart. God, that was annoying.
Greg had recently accused her of remembering more details about entry wounds and killers’ signatures than she remembered about the events and anniversaries in their life together. There had been no point in arguing with him. She knew he was right. Perhaps she didn’t deserve a husband or a family or a life. How could any female FBI agent expect a man to understand her job, let alone something like this…this obsession? Was it an obsession? Was Gwen right?
She set the pizza aside and realized that her hands had a slight tremble. When she looked up, she saw that Gwen noticed the tremor, too.
“When was the last time you slept through the night?” Her friend’s brow crinkled with concern.
She chose to ignore the question and avoided Gwen’s green Irish eyes as well. “Just because there hasn’t been a murder doesn’t mean he hasn’t started his collection again.”
“And if he has, Kyle will be watching.” Gwen rarely slipped, using Assistant Director Cunningham’s first name, except times like now, when she seemed genuinely concerned and worried. “Let it go, Maggie. Let it go before it destroys you.”
“It’s not going to destroy me. I’m pretty damn tough, remember?” But she couldn’t meet her friend’s eyes for fear that Gwen would see the lie.
“Ah, tough,” Gwen said, sitting back. “So that’s why you’re walking around your own home with a gun stashed in the back of your pants.”
Maggie winced. Gwen caught it and smiled.
“Now, see, instead of tough,” she told Maggie, “I think I would have called it stubborn.”
CHAPTER 8
He couldn’t remember pizza delivery girls being so cute back in his younger days when he had worked at the local pizza place. Hell, he couldn’t remember there being delivery girls back then.
He watched her hurry up the sidewalk, strands of long blond hair trailing behind her. She had her hair in a cute ponytail—sticking out the back of her blue baseball cap, a Chicago Cubs cap. He wondered if she was a fan. Or maybe her boyfriend was. Surely she had a boyfriend somewhere.
It was too dark now to depend on the streetlights. His eyes were already stinging and a bit blurred. He slipped on the night goggles and adjusted the magnification. Yes, this was good.
He saw her check her watch as she waited on the front porch. This time another man answered the door. Of course, the guy would give her that dumb-ass look of astonishment. The man fished bills out of the pockets of his blue jeans, jeans that sagged at his bulging waist. He was a slob, grimy with sweat stains under the armpits of his T-shirt and a tuft of hair sticking up out the neckline. And yet…yep, there it was, another wiseass remark about how cute she was or what he wouldn’t mind tipping her with. But again, she smiled politely, despite the color rising in her cheeks.
Just once he’d like to see her kick one of these idiots in the groin. Maybe that was a lesson he could teach her. If things worked out as he planned, he’d have plenty of time with her.
She hurried away along the winding sidewalk, and the cheap bastard who had tipped her only a dollar, watched her ass the whole trip back to her shiny little Dodge Dart. That sight alone was worth much more than a dollar. The cheap son of a bitch. How the hell was she supposed to put herself through college on dollar tips?
He decided that women were better tippers when it came to delivery services. Maybe they felt some odd sense of guilt for not having prepared the meal themselves. Who knew. Women were complicated, fascinating creatures, and he wouldn’t change that if he could.
He replaced the goggles with dark sunglasses, simply out of habit now, and because the oncoming headlights